Remedy had originally planned a sequel to its cult horror game Alan Wake, but despite pitching the idea to various publishers, the project sadly never amounted to anything.
If you’re a fan of the original though, you might be interested to see what the team had in mind. Polygon has been talking to various developers at the Finnish studio, and trying to work out why the ball never got rolling on a second game.
”For Alan Wake, from the get-go, we assumed there was going to be a sequel and we mapped things further out when it came to character, story, details and focus changes,” said Remedy’s creative director and head writer Sam Lake. “We knew we would have to iterate and refine, but there was always a rough road map there.”
You can see Remedy’s pitch video for the sequel here. It stars a more world-weary and experienced Alan Wake, someone who is slowly learning how best to go about not getting skewered by manifestations of evil.
”Clearly in the prototype we see Alan Wake himself as a more experienced player in the secret war against the forces of darkness,” explains Lake. ”It’s clear that escaping from the dark place can’t be too easy and there should be a price to pay,” he continues. ”So going into the sequel, there needs to be further journey and story arc for him to escape.”
Lake and the team at Remedy still hope to work on another Wake game, but for the moment Microsoft has nudged them in a more action-focused direction, with time-altering shooter Quantum Break, an upcoming exclusive for the Xbox One. Alan Wake fans shouldn’t abandon hope just yet, though.
”It was one of the most engrossing and cinematic games of the Xbox 360 generation and I think it would be interesting to see what Remedy would do if they decided to revisit the IP again,” says Microsoft’s Xbox head Phil Spencer.
As for Remedy, Lake says the team is “discussing the possibility of an Alan Wake sequel with multiple partners”, though nothing has been decided just yet. Keep those fingers crossed, horror fans.
